This
matter is before the Court pursuant to Defendant Saowapha
Thinram's (“Defendant”) Appeal from an Order
for Detention Filed in Texas. (Doc. No. 303.) On August 28,
2017, the United States of America (“the
Government”) filed a Response in Opposition to Motion
to Reconsider Detention Order. (Doc. No. 345.)

On
September 20, 2017, a detention hearing was held before the
undersigned. At the hearing, the Court took the matter under
advisement.

ORDER

1.
Defendant Saowapha Thinram's Appeal from an Order for
Detention Filed in Texas (Doc. No. [303]) is respectfully
DENIED.

Defendant
is alleged to be one of the house bosses for the
sex-trafficking organization, along with her husband,
Co-Defendant Gregory Allen Kimmy (“Kimmy”). House
bosses are alleged to have run the day-to-day operations,
including advertising victims for commercial sex acts,
procuring and maintaining the houses of prostitution,
scheduling sex buyers, and ensuring that a portion of the
cash was routed back to pay down the victims' bondage
debts. (Indictment ¶ 5(b).) In exchange, house bosses
retained a significant portion of the cash that the victims
receive, typically forty percent. (Id.) House bosses
would also coordinate with traffickers and other house bosses
to facilitate the victims' travel to other cities in the
United States. Once victims were lured to the United States,
they were forced to work long hours-often all day, every day-
having sex with strangers to attempt to pay down their
bondage debt. Victims typically did not have the ability to
choose with whom they had sex, what sex transactions they
would engage in, or when they would have sex. Defendant and
her husband are lessors of a house where law enforcement
observed activity consistent with an active house of
prostitution.

According
to the search warrant affidavit, Special Agent Tonya Price
interviewed victim prostitutes identified as W-2, W-41, and
W-42. W-2 identified Defendant as “Nancy” and
stated that Defendant ran a “working” house of
prostitution in Austin, Texas, and charged $60 per commercial
sex act as the “house fee.” W-2 also stated that
Defendant advertised W-2 and other Thai women online using
ECCIE.net. Further, W-2 told Agent Price that Defendant would
call W-2 to let her know when a commercial sex buyer was
coming. W-2 also stated that Defendant took a photograph of
her passport book.

Special
Agent Price also interviewed W-41 who stated that she had
recently paid off her $40, 000 bondage debt, which took
approximately six months to complete. She did not claim that
that the debt was paid to either Defendant or Co-Defendant
Kimmy. W-41 did state, however, that she was sent to various
houses of prostitution in Kirkwood, Washington; Kansas City;
Los Angles; and Houston and Austin, Texas. W-41 also stated
that she paid Co-Defendant Kimmy and Defendant half of the
money she earned from commercial sex acts.[1]

On May
30, 2017, the Honorable Andrew W. Austin in the District
Court for the Western District of Texas, Austin Division,
held a detention hearing pursuant to the Government's
motion to detain Defendant pending trial. The Magistrate
Judge observed that Defendant has few ties to the United
States: Defendant first came to the United States as a
victim-prostitute in the same sex trafficking scheme
implicated in this case. Consequently, when Defendant paid
off her “debt” to gain her freedom, she remained
in the United States. Defendant also has an 11-year-old son
who resides in the Austin, Texas area with her and who is a
lawful permanent resident. Due to the fact that both
Defendant and her husband have been detained, Defendant's
mother-in-law has been caring for Defendant's 11-year-old
son and Kimmy's other three children.[2]

The
Magistrate Judge also observed that Defendant has many ties
to Thailand: All of Defendant's siblings and her mother
reside in Thailand, as does her 19-year-old son.
Additionally, Defendant owns a residence in Thailand.
Defendant, however, does not have a bank account in her name
and, in the words of the Magistrate Judge, “relies
entirely on her husband for access to money.” Defendant
last traveled to Thailand in 2015 to visit her son, who was
diagnosed with leukemia, and whose medical care she pays for.
She and Kimmy also traveled to Thailand in 2014 for the same
purpose.

Pursuant
to Rule 46(b) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and
18 U.S.C. § 3142, the Court considered the following
factors in assessing the continued detention of Defendant:

(1) the nature and circumstances of the offense charged,
including whether the offense ...

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